Alabama (17-8, 9-3 SEC) is in second place in the league. It has won five of its past six games and nine of its past 11.

Mississippi State (7-17, 2-10) is tied with South Carolina for last place in the league. The Bulldogs have lost 10 consecutive games, beginning with a 75-43 loss to Alabama on Jan. 16 at Starkville, Miss.

But in the SEC, a feeling prevails that after first-place Florida, every other team is second rate.

“I don’t think there’s a big difference between second and – not a knock against Alabama – but second and really the bottom of our league,” Texas A&M coach Billy Kennedy said Monday.

So Alabama coach Anthony Grant wasn’t just spewing clichés Tuesday when he talked about a need to take the last six games of the regular season one game at a time.

If the Crimson Tide could beat Mississippi State by 32 points on the road, shouldn’t this be an easy game at home?

“When you look at some of the losses we’ve had over the season, I don’t think we’re a team that can afford to take anyone lightly,” Grant said.

The most recent example is a 49-37 loss at Auburn that is the only blemish on the Tide’s record in the past six games. But nonconference losses at home to Mercer and Tulane also are not forgotten.

Take this victory for granted? Not Grant.

“Anytime you’re in the SEC, you’ve got to come, you’ve got to be ready to play,” Grant said. “Hopefully our guys are intelligent enough to understand based on what we’ve done over the course of the year that we can’t afford to do that.

“If we don’t show up prepared to play our best, we can get beat by anyone. If we do, we can beat anybody. That’s just the nature of college basketball in our league right now.”

Don’t be deceived by that final score five weeks ago.

“Obviously the final score was one-sided, but myself and our staff and hopefully our players understand that it was an eight-point game at the half,” Grant said. “You’re dealing with a team that right now is going through some struggles, but it has guys that are capable. We have to make sure we bring our best focus, our best energy and play up to where we’re capable of playing.”

In perhaps its best 20 minutes of the season, the Tide made 19-28 field-goal attempts (.679) and outscored the Bulldogs 45-21 in the second half.

“We shot the ball well,” Grant said. “We hit five 3’s in a row. … But I thought the story of that game was the way we defended. We forced a lot of turnovers, and those turnovers really translated into opportunities for us in transition.”

The Bulldogs will be playing without one or two players Wednesday. Sophomore forward Roquez Johnson (9.3 ppg, 4.5 rpg) has been suspended indefinitely for violating a team rule, first-year coach Rick Ray announced Monday. Suspended junior guard Jalen Steele (9.3 ppg) has missed the past three games, and his status for this week was “yet to be determined,” Ray said Monday.

Steele started and played 24 minutes on Jan. 16 against Alabama but scored only five points. Johnson came off the bench and had three points in 26 minutes.

Grant acknowledged that the Bulldogs have changed “a lot” since the first meeting.

“The first time we played them, they were 2-0 in the league and had momentum,” Grant said. “We were 1-1. They’ve had some difficulties here of late. I can’t speak for their coach, but … anytime you take over a program and you’re trying to build and change a culture and establish your identity, there’s going to be some things that happen over the course of doing that. They’re going through some of that.

“For us, we expect with them being an hour away from our campus, it’s a big rivalry game, so we expect a tremendous effort, great energy in the building, and we’ve got to be able to match that and surpass it.”